This object moves — fetching its current position…
Score breakdown
· 5 badges
47 pts · Rare
Rare50 pts → Epic
Spinning past the rubble-pile limit+22
Potentially hazardous+12
Aten: mostly inside Earth's orbit+8
Near-Earth object+5
Catalogue designation only+0
Total score47
3 more points to reach Epic.
Badges
🌠Near-Earth object· +5
⚠️Potentially hazardous· +12
🔢Catalogue designation only
⚱️Aten: mostly inside Earth's orbit· +8
⏰Spinning past the rubble-pile limit· +22
✨ Trivia
Handle with care
🛡️What 'hazardous' means. 'Potentially hazardous' is bookkeeping, not a prediction: it means the orbit passes within 0.05 AU of Earth's and the body is big enough to matter. Nothing on that list is known to be on a collision course.
☄️If it ever hit. A rock this size arriving at a typical 20 km/s would release around 1109 megatons — about 22.2 times the largest bomb ever detonated.
What it actually is
🛸Its orbit family. An Aten-class object, spending most of its time inside Earth's orbit and crossing ours from the sunward side — which makes this family wretchedly hard to spot against the daylight.
🌞Closest approach. At its nearest it comes within 0.54 AU of the Sun — inside the orbit of Venus.
🔁One lap. A single orbit around the Sun takes it about 319 days.
🥏How far it roams. Its orbit swings between 0.54 and 1.29 AU from the Sun.
Sense of scale
🧱Sense of scale. In everyday terms it is about 2.5 football pitches across.
Standing on it
🦘Don't jump. Escape velocity here is only around 0.16 m/s. A determined jump would launch you off it and into your own orbit around the Sun.
Properties
aphelion au
1.29
designation
216523
eccentricity
0.4121
full name
216523 (2001 HY7)
h mag
20.7
inclination
5.21
mean motion deg day
1.128
moid au
0.0352
name
(216523) 2001 HY7
number only
yes
orbit class
ATE
perihelion au
0.537
pha
yes
rotation period h
0.042
semi major au
0.9137
About (216523) 2001 HY7
(216523) 2001 HY7 is a rare neo. It swings within 0.537 AU of the Sun at perihelion.
An Aten-class object, spending most of its time inside Earth's orbit and crossing ours from the sunward side — which makes this family wretchedly hard to spot against the daylight.
How to see it
Like any astronomical target, (216523) 2001 HY7 is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. Because it moves against the background stars, the live position panel on this page tracks where it is right now. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.
Why (216523) 2001 HY7 is a rare neo
(216523) 2001 HY7 scores 47 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 3 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 5 science badges — Near-Earth object, Potentially hazardous, Catalogue designation only, Aten: mostly inside Earth's orbit and Spinning past the rubble-pile limit — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.